Additives worth the price?

Dan wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@4ax.com:

No.

fuel injector cleaner can be useful in some situations, but the rest are a waste, and in the case of oil additives, potentially harmful to the motor.

The only one I recommend is the fuel injector cleaner, but only as needed. Hondas aren't very sensitive to deposits and you can go years without getting the balkiness that normally signals dirty injectors. If you fill up with "top tier" gasoline (like Chevron) even occasionally you aren't likely to need even that.

Mike

"Michael Pardee" wrote in news:wvidndxGGL3tUALZnZ2dnUVZ snipped-for-privacy@sedona.net:

Hondas aren't susceptible at ALL to dirty injectors. If you run an injector service, you're removing deposits from the valve tops and the combustion chamber.

Take care of the car and you will never experience fuel delivery problems with a Honda. There's a damn good reason those injectors cost $287Cdn each new.

not quite true. poor starting is often the fault of a leaky injector, and running cleaner through typically sorts that out. similarly, hesitation is another problem and that's sorted by cleaner too.

don't forget, the exterior appearance of an injector doesn't show the interior.

which is no bad thing.

jim beam wrote in news:SfOdnVveTNyEcwLZnZ2dnUVZ snipped-for-privacy@speakeasy.net:

True. Forgot that one.

ALL the injectors I pulled out of various wrecks a while ago were squeaky clean. Every one. Including those from one car that was an obvious sludger.

You can pull the screen baskets and peer inside. Squeaky clean, I tell you.

sure, but you can get different spray patterns before and after cleaning, so there has to be /something/ going on!

In a word, no!

Just walk away from all that crap. Use good quality fuel like one of the Top-Tier brands and correct, good quality lubricants changed regularly and you are doing your car all the good it needs.

John

That takes me to my prime question since I bought my new Civic last week (and gave the '88 to charity). What the hell is MMT and top tier gas? This is the Top tier gas site:

this is an article about top tier gas always ran AMOCO, now BP, high test in my old civic. My chiefengineer always ran it in all his cars as he said it kept themcleaner. But, I digress... I intended to follow Honda's advice an burn regular as a cost cutting measure (but not at the expense of the car). Now I see I cannot, according to Honda, use BP at all---while Ford is recommending it for their cars. Among the gasolines listed on the sites above, here in Virginia Beach, I can find a Shell station if I look for it. We have BP, Exxon, Texaco. Some of the other brands on the list may be available locally, but a cursory exam of phone book doesn't reveal them TIA sign me //Confused//

I always ran AMOCO, now BP, high test in my old civic. My chief> engineer always ran it in all his cars as he said it kept them> cleaner.

if you're using high octane in a civic, unless it's got a high compression engine like an sir, you're wasting a lot of money. energy content of high and low octane is pretty much the same, [not exactly, but good enough], but there's /big/ differences in combustion speed. if you're using high octane in an engine tunes for low octane, mixture is not burning fast enough for the ignition timing, so still-burning mixture is going out of the exhaust - an utter waste of energy and money. stick to regular - it's what the engine is tuned for, just like it says in the manual.

O.K. I accept that. The real problem I'm having is this bit about MMT and Top Tier gas. Or, now that I am burning regular in my new Civic, it appears, at least in the largest city in the state, that my choices are Shell, Shell and Shell. Yet, did you see in a following thread where her Honda dealer a $100 gas card with her car purchase---for Exxon-Mobil---not a Top Tier gas. Either Honda has us, Don Quioxte-like, tilting at windmills, or they have forgotten to tell their dealers what their intent is. I'm sure they are steering clear of naming some particular gas (es) as they don't want to offend any of the major refiners. Let's just leave the car buyer in the lurch instead, trying to fgure out their policies. Maybe it's like when I was on active duty---there's no reason for it, it's just our policy

MMT is an additive which I don't think has ever been used in the US but is or was used in Canada. Unless you are driving in Canada you have nothing to worry about with MMT.

Top Tier gas supposedly means higher detergent levels are assured. Other fuels might be just as good, might be better or might be worse.

Confusing, eh?

If you stick with major brand fuels you are probably never going to have a fuel related problem.

John

And it says this in writing I can take to Honda when the engine expires---where??? Well, I got my post-purchase phone call from Honda coporate yesterday, so I dropped the ball in their lap. Won't make a difference, but it made me feel better. Maybe "bad press" will help. I help edit an online newspaper.

Uh, why exactly did you post your question on usenet? Did you want honest opinion, or do you just want to think like a lawyer and wring your virtual hands?

John

I value any opinion. So, I just got off the phone with American Honda customer service in L.A. Recognizing that this young lady had to get up at 4 a.m. to get to work so they could open their lines at 6 a.m. L.A. time, so that they could talk to us on the east Coast, I am going to attempt to reflect she said: The list of fuel providers as reflected in the sites I cited in my first post is correct. There are no additions. If using something else, one cannot expect as good gas mileage, and prolonged use of non list refiners "could damage the engine" Her recommendation was to follow the list, and that if I had to go with a non-listed provider, to shift back to a listed provider as soon as possible. So, all you folks with 2006 Civics (and others listed by Honda) plus BMW, GM and Honda, this is another opinion - and in the case of Honda, the corporate opinion.

this whole question fascinates me. some people have great difficulty believing that there's differences between gasoline brands. often the "they all come from the same refinery" argument is used in defense of this position, and it's often true, many /do/ come from the same refinery. but they're /not/ all the same.

people have no difficulty believing that beers are different, mainly because they can rely on their own sense of taste to do the analysis, even though many come from the same brewery. similarly, products like paint are easily distinguishable, even though a lot of major brands come from the same factory. it's the same with gasoline. formulations are complex and very carefully controlled between brands, as you might suspect if you consider that there's billions of dollars at stake. they smell different, the perform different, and less obviously, their chemical properties are different. there's minimum standards to which gasolines have to conform [calorie content sadly /not/ on the list] but beyond that, there's significant scope for variance.

Not me. Nearly 50 years ago when I bought my first MGA, I could see the RPM difference - Shell always made for a higher RPM. Loved the beer analogy - Went to school in Milwaukee, surrounded by Millers, Pabst, Schlitz and Blatz.

Maybe it's the journalist in me, for it's that aspect of the issue that gets to me - the "billions of dollars" part. Especially when we read in the article at the cited site: "Left out of the Top Tier alliance, Ford has taken the unprecedented step of recommending a specific gasoline brand. Starting with 2006 models, Ford vehicles have "Ford Recommends BP" printed on its gas cap..." Sounds more like a you-scratch-my-back type alliance, than a best-gas-for-the-car alliance. Anyhow, the Texaco station on a nearby corner just converted to Shell. I guess they knew I was coming.

These recommendations usually have everything to do with marketing dollars. Several vehicle carry recommendations to use Mobil-1 oil. Does that mean that Mobil-1 is superior to all other synthetic oils? Of course not. It only means that the two companies have struck a deal.

John

MMT is methylcyclopentadienyl manganese tricarbonyl, a gasoline additive made by the Ethyl Corporation. Ethyl is the bunch that brought you tetraethyl lead.

The fear is that MMT, which contains manganese, will cause central nervous system damage to people who live in densely-populated areas.

Top Tier Detergent Gasoline is a set of standards created by a consortium of automakers--BMW, GM, Honda and Toyota--for high-quality detergent gas. The only problem I've got with this is that none of the gas companies on the list at

except for Shell, sell gas in Cumberland County, NC. Oh...to answer the OP...except in very extreme circumstances, like when you've been running stale gas and now your injectors are partially clogged, additives don't do much for you.

--jm